


i've always been a coward (and i don't know what's good for me)

by whomstisthis



Category: ATEEZ (Band)
Genre: (kinda), Alternate Universe - College/University, Bottom Song Mingi, Dirty Talk, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff, Fluff and Smut, Good boys!, Humor, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Pet Names, Pining, Praise Kink, Smut, Strangers to Lovers, hongjoong is also vegan?, tattoo artist hongjoong, top hongjoong, virgin mingi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-01
Updated: 2020-01-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 16:27:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22060045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whomstisthis/pseuds/whomstisthis
Summary: mingi sneezes again, his face scrunching up.“bless you!” the weird little voice says again. mingi looks to his right towards the sound of the voice, and suddenly there’s this sharp-looking little dude with a mullet (?) and a book in his hand leaning over his table and he’s smiling huge, like what a wolf’s smile would look like if the wolf were a human, and fuck, is mingi experiencing a monster energy-induced hallucination?(or: minjoong college au!!!!!!!!)
Relationships: Choi San/Jung Wooyoung, Kim Hongjoong/Song Mingi
Comments: 94
Kudos: 740
Collections: Ateez fics for clear skin





	i've always been a coward (and i don't know what's good for me)

**Author's Note:**

> HAPPY NEW YEAR…..!!!!! Who’d have thought i’d still be writing kpop fic in the year 2020! lmfao! I bet u thought u’d seen da last of me…… but i’m back... >:D This is maybe the most fun and silly thing i’ve written in a long time….maybe ever ! …. i can only get time to write when i’m not doing school stuff but guess what babey it’s winter break and here is the minjoong that’s been burning a hole in my brain since like ….september !!!!! Mwah , enjoy >:}}}}
> 
> TITLE FROM HOUNDS OF LOVE BY KATE BUSH <3
> 
> PS [here](https://66.media.tumblr.com/0ff206fd2bdb2384796373add23d1737/826f6f4c10184312-b7/s1280x1920/a3f0d56ad60f578c0000f12cd32fb230e0739690.jpg) is the silly little moodboard that i made for this fic! enjoy!
> 
> ALSO.... some of the texts/dms include emojis and i can see them on my macbook/iphone but if ur reading on something else u might not be able to.....but um u can just message me about that if u want and i can clear things up for u <3
> 
> ANOTHER thing here is my [kofi](https://ko-fi.com/whomstisthis) if u would want to send a lil support my way!! it would be much appreciated and rly truly encourages me to write!!! :3

Mingi is fucked, God, he’s so fucked. It’s creeping up on 2 am and he’s here withering like a raisin under the fluorescent lights on the second floor of the university library, fighting a cold, surrounded by tissues and cherry cough drop wrappers, only four pages into his ten page paper that’s due in class at 11 the next morning. 

He sniffles, sadly takes a sip of his monster energy drink (rehab raspberry flavor, hell yeah), and blows his irritated nose. God, he’s so fucked. The words he’s written so far blur together on his laptop screen, and he realizes how little he cares about contemporary Irish art, and he had only taken this class because he thought it was going to be easy, and oh, shit— 

He sneezes three times in quick succession, like a little cat. 

“Bless you,” a ghostly little voice says from somewhere in the stacks to Mingi’s right. Mingi absently wonders if it’s the voice of God, and wonders if he’s currently having a “Virgin Mary” moment, haha, “Virgin Mingi”, fuck, he really needs to lose his V-card— 

He sneezes again, his face scrunching up. 

“Bless you!” the weird little voice says again. Mingi looks to his right towards the sound of the voice, and suddenly there’s this sharp-looking little dude with a mullet (?) and a book in his hand leaning over his table and he’s smiling huge, like what a wolf’s smile would look like if the wolf were a human, and fuck, is Mingi experiencing a Monster energy-induced hallucination? 

“Thanks?” Mingi finally says to the sexy pointy ghost, only he’s so stuffed up and congested that it comes out more like “theks” which is kind of cute, honestly, but a little bit embarrassing too. 

“You need a tissue?” the guy asks, slinking down into the seat diagonal from Mingi and placing his book on the table. 

“I have some,” he says, gesturing to the scattered tissues strewn all over the place. 

“Oh,” the guy says, looking at Mingi’s setup and smiling another little smile. He has so many teeth, Mingi thinks, looking at his teeth.

And then he opens his book, starts reading, and Mingi simply writes him off as a silly stress/sickness/caffeine/virginity-induced mirage. 

Only, the next morning at around 7:30 when Mingi finally regains awareness of his surroundings after putting the finishing touches on his 2,600 words of absolute nonsense, he looks up, blinks his eyes blearily like a sleepy kitten, and sees the pointy guy asleep across from him at the table, using his book as a pillow. 

That’s bonkers, Mingi thinks, wondering what kind of weirdo stays in the library all night to read. 

He packs up and goes home to nap before class. He dreams of a giant mouse getting chased by a tiny cat in the middle of Times Square, which is super weird and random, and then he wakes up craving something sweet. 

He goes about the rest of his day as normal. That is to say, he goes to class, turns in his paper, goes to the gym with Jongho (but mainly just sits by the mirror pouting while Jongho lifts weights twice the size of his head— only because he’s sick though, seriously, he normally does lift too, swear to God), makes himself a super epic waffle at the dining hall with chocolate chips from the ice cream station, and then heads over to Yeosang and Wooyoung’s apartment for some Angry Orchard Hard Ciders and stimulating conversation. 

He still feels like shit, though, so he’s sprawled out on the couch with his head on Yunho’s lap and his legs draped over Wooyoung, just to make sure he stays the center of attention even when his throat hurts too much to chime into the discussion as much as he’d like to. 

They’re watching some intense cooking show where Gordon Ramsay yells a lot at people in chef’s outfits, and Mingi’s not too sure what’s going on because the only thing he’s ever watched about chefs was Ratatouille (2007) and that at least had a super crazy plot about a talking rat to keep him interested, but he tries to stay awake for everyone’s sake. 

Only, he did pull that all-nighter last night, and so he finds himself falling asleep anyway. Nooo, he thinks drowsily, hoping his friends don’t lose interest in him after he knocks out, but also hoping that they’ll at least notice how cute and angelic he looks when he sleeps. 

He has another totally random, indecipherable dream, which seems to be becoming a trend in his little subconscious lately. In the dream, he’s back in the library on the second floor. Everything is the same, until he looks to his right and there’s the boy with the sharp, dangerous features again, only he’s different somehow, and dream-Mingi can’t put his dream-finger on why. The boy sits down next to Mingi and pulls a tissue out of his pocket. Mingi takes it, but he realizes it’s connected to another tissue, and he keeps pulling and pulling only to realize it’s a chain of connected tissues, just like how clowns always have a chain of multicolored handkerchiefs in their pockets at all times. And then the boy starts laughing, and it sounds like bells, and a bunch of giant rats start crawling out from the bookshelves, and Mingi wants to run but he’s still holding onto the chain of clown tissues so he can’t. 

He wakes up and feels eerie. 

Yunho pets his head though, and as if he knows exactly what Mingi wants, says to everyone, “The baby’s finally awake, huh.” Everyone coos and laughs and Mingi feels good again. 

It isn’t until next week, after he’s finally gotten over his cold and returned to his regular, silly, super strong and sexy and fearless self (who goes to the gym and lifts, seriously) that he remembers the pointy hallucination boy from the library. 

Jongho takes him to the gym again and makes him do one of his freak workouts, and Mingi totally would be able to handle it on a normal day, for real, but as everyone knows, he’s just gotten over a really bad cold, and his body is still recovering. 

So whatever, he’s all sore and pouty and feeling like an overcooked spaghetti noodle, and Jongho suggests that instead of going to the dining hall they go to his favorite vegan restaurant for a post-workout snack, which just reminds Mingi how weird Jongho is, because when has he ever expressed interest in vegan food? Is Jongho vegan? Come to think of it, Mingi’s pretty sure that no one in their friend group actually knows where Jongho lives, or who he lives with, or where he’s from, or what he’s majoring in. 

He’s about to open his mouth and ask when Jongho puts him in a surprise headlock, which makes no sense because he’s about a billion inches shorter than Mingi and it isn’t supposed to work like that, but it’s enough to make him focus on the task at hand, which is deciphering the menu at this weird-ass place. 

It’s one of those fast-casual spots that tend to pop up near college campuses— where you order at the counter, take a number, and then some poor underpaid nineteen-year-old eventually brings your bowl of vegetables and brown rice and flax seeds to your table. Jongho has already ordered and picked a spot to sit, apparently, in the time it’s taken Mingi to try to figure out what a “chickpea crouton” would taste like, so he’s on his own. 

He decides on the safest option, just some grain bowl with enough kale in it to make him shiver (which doesn’t actually sound safe at all, but he’s thinking comparatively). And he’s repeating the stupid name in his head as he walks up to the counter so he doesn’t fuck it up and make himself look like an idiot, but then he actually becomes aware of his surroundings and realizes that the boy behind the counter is so small and sharp that it could only be one person. 

His mullet is partially hidden under a black beanie, probably a health safety thing, Mingi intelligently points out to himself, although it’s a bit of a bummer because he actually kind of thought the mullet was sexy and not even in a Billy Ray Cyrus kind of way. But it’s probably for the best because it would totally suck to find a mullet hair in your grain bowl, even if it was from a scalp as hot as this guy’s. 

He’s thinking too many thoughts at once, so when he goes up to the counter he’s extra nervous, and he’s not sure if it would be an appropriate thing to let this guy know that he’s not sick anymore, just in case he was wondering, or if it would be appropriate to even acknowledge that they shared a library table for 6 hours at all. 

He’s saved from making that decision when the guy just says, smiling that sexy/scary/teethy smile: “Heyyyy, I know you! You feeling better?” 

“Oh, yeah,” Mingi says, blushing. “It was just a cold.” 

“Cool. That’s good,” he says, looking up at Mingi with these crazy big lynx eyes and playing with the strings of his apron. “You finish that thing you were working so hard on?” 

“Yeah,” Mingi blushes again. “I’m not good at prioritizing so I always end up writing papers at the last minute. I got an A- though.” 

“Hey, okay,” he smiles. Mingi can’t take his eyes off his canines. “That’s dope, congrats.”

“Yeah…” he says, desperately thinking of a cool and slick way to continue the conversation. “So you work here?” 

“Yup,” the guy says, now twirling one of the pens from the counter around in his dexterous little fingers. 

“Do you like it?” 

“It’s… interesting. The main reason I haven’t quit is because of the drama. It’s like a soap opera back here.” 

Mingi raises his eyebrows. 

The guy giggles. “Three of the drinks girls have a crush on this one guy from salads, but he’s been hooking up with one of the back of house guys for like three months. I think I’m the only one who knows, but I want to be here when the secret gets out.”

“Shit,” Mingi says, eyes wide. “Yeah. You have to stay.” 

“So are you here to eat, or just to chat? Not that I’m opposed to chatting,” he says, finally putting down the pen he’d been twirling. 

“Oh, no, sorry, I’m here with my friend who is probably already eating already, fuck. Umm, I forget what I wanted. What’s your favorite one of these bowl things?” 

The guy points to one of the complicated names on the menu, and Mingi just says “sure, yeah, can I have that?” 

“Can I get a name?” the guy asks, looking like he could eat Mingi for breakfast and lunch and dinner even though he’s probably vegan and wouldn’t. 

“Oh, um, Mingi.” 

“Mingi,” he says, and then he honest-to-god winks at him. “Got it.” 

They look at each other, and Mingi feels something big and weird and thinks that maybe he wouldn’t mind being eaten by this guy. 

“That’s gonna be $9.57,” he finally says. “And my name’s Hongjoong, by the way.” 

Mingi ends up giving him a 25% tip and a shy little smile, and then panic-runs away to find Jongho. 

Hongjoong, Hongjoong, Hongjoong. The name doesn’t leave his brain for the next few days. It’s such a unique name, which is what Mingi tells himself when he can’t seem to forget about it even after humming “God’s Plan” by Drake a million times to try and get it out of his head. 

Mingi’s from New Jersey but he grew up around Koreans and he’s still never met anyone with a name like that. Hongjoong. Mingi wonders where he’s from. He didn’t sound like he had an accent, so he’s probably not an international student. Mingi’s sure he’s from somewhere cool, like Seattle or Portland or Colorado, and he probably grew up smoking legal weed and walking around barefoot. 

Mingi sighs, and pictures his mom and his brother and their little two-story house in Ridgefield. Then he clicks “play next episode” of The Great British Baking Show and feels a little better. 

It doesn’t last for long though, because as soon as the episode’s over he’s wondering if Hongjoong likes baking, or at least watching The Great British Baking Show, and then he gets a little nervous because he imagines Hongjoong telling him he doesn’t like it, which would be earth-shattering, and a major blow. 

So Mingi gets on Tinder for a little while, wiggles his body around in his bed trying to get comfortable, and swipes left on everyone he sees because they’re not pointy enough. 

By Wednesday of the following week he’s almost considering going back to that terrifying vegan place and paying $9.57 + a 25% tip just to talk to Hongjoong again. Luckily, the big God man in the sky is definitely looking out for him today because he’s walking from class back to his dorm when he sees him (Hongjoong!) coming out of the hipstery coffee-shop that Mingi is always too afraid to go into. He has his own reusable travel mug clutched in his little hands, and is wearing plaid pants and combat boots, which look very cool, although Mingi thinks that the statement piece of his outfit is probably the giant cropped fur coat that’s draped over his shoulders. 

They’re approaching each other fast, too fast, and even though Mingi has been fantasizing about seeing Hongjoong for the past week and a half he’s suddenly so nervous and jittery that he’s about to just pretend not to notice him and pass right by— 

“Hey!” Hongjoong says, pulling his giant professional-looking headphones off his ears, revealing a little dent in his mullet where they’d been resting. “I feel like I keep seeing you everywhere suddenly. What’s up?” 

Mingi stops, and he can’t think of anything cool to say, because what _is_ up? He can’t just come out and say he’s been seeing Hongjoong’s name imprinted in bold on the ceiling of his bedroom every night before he goes to sleep. 

“Not much!” Mingi says, going scarlet, thanking the shitty Boston weather for being cold as fuck and hoping Hongjoong doesn’t notice. “Super, um, cold. I hate Boston.” 

“Me too!” Hongjoong says, his face lighting up in excitement, and oh, fuck, Mingi can see all of his teeth. He gulps. “Finally another person who hates it here as much as I do. Where are you from?” 

“New Jersey,” Mingi says. “So I don’t really have any excuse for being cold, I just don’t like it.” 

Hongjoong giggles, clicking the cap on his mug open and closed. Mingi notices he has a habit of playing with whatever’s in his hands when he talks. “Ahhh, okayyy, got it. I’m from California, so, like, the past three years here have been kinda fucked. That’s why I bought this coat,” he says, doing a silly little half-twirl that makes him look like a little winter fairy and makes Mingi feel like he’s been punched hard in the stomach, and then he remembers his mom telling him that’s how Houdini _died_ and he panics for a second but pulls himself together pretty quick.

“Is it made out of real fur? I assumed you were, uhh, vegan,” says Mingi, wondering a second too late if that’s an offensive thing to say? He’s not sure how the whole veganism thing works but he totally respects it, seriously. 

Hongjoong just laughs again like Mingi is the funniest person in the world, which Mingi knows for a fact is not true because Yunho is the _actual_ funniest person in the world and there’s literally no one who could prove otherwise, but he can’t say he completely hates making Hongjoong laugh so he’ll forget about the semantics for a second. 

“Oh my God,” Hongjoong says, eyes crinkling up in that crazy feline way. “I am, but I got this coat from the thrift store so I’m not supporting the fur industry. Some vegans in the Facebook groups I’m in think it’s kind of fucked to wear fur at all, but faux fur is actually worse for the environment, so, whatever. And it’s just too cute not to wear, don’t you think?” 

Mingi only understood about 1/4 of the words that were just said, but then Hongjoong does another silly little winter fairy pose and Mingi forgets about everything else and has to tell himself he’s not going to die like Harry Houdini right now, he’s _not_. 

“It’s really cute,” Mingi says, nodding his head fervently. 

“You think so?” 

“Yup, yeah.” 

“Hm, I’ll note that,” Hongjoong says, pretending to write something down with his free hand in a little imaginary notebook. “Listen, I’m so fucking cold right now so I really need to go home. But I’ll see you soon?” 

“Yeah, for sure!” Mingi says, a little breathlessly, not knowing what to do with his hands and eventually just shoving them in his pockets. 

“Cool,” Hongjoong says, and then he touches him lightly on the arm. “Stay warm, Mingi!”

And then he’s gone, and Mingi’s legs feel like if his bones suddenly got replaced with something with a lot less structural integrity, like cotton balls or marshmallow fluff. 

He trembles all the way home, and Boston may be cold in November but it’s not _that_ cold. 

When he gets back to the suite he shares with Yunho and two other random dudes, Yunho is in the shared common area playing GTA, and Mingi barely even notices. 

“Bro, hello?” Yunho calls, pausing his game as Mingi opens the door to his bedroom. “What’s good?” 

Mingi stares at him. “I have a new crush.” 

Yunho just sighs. “Oh, jeez, Mingi.” 

That night, he’s trying to do a reading for one of his classes when his phone vibrates with an instagram notification. 

_hj.kim has requested to follow you!_

He almost cracks his screen from the intensity with which he unlocks his phone to see Hongjoong’s instagram, which is blessedly public. _Followed by choi_san, wuuyoungjung, and 2 others._

How the fuck do San and Wooyoung know Hongjoong? He makes a mental note to harass them in the groupchat later. 

Hongjoong’s instagram is basically what Mingi expected, though: he posts pictures of his outfits, pictures of his hot alternative friends, pictures of buildings and plants and flowers, etc. Judging by his most recent picture, his 21st birthday was like, a few days ago. His feed is pretty and cohesive without looking like he tried to get it that way, and Mingi feels a little self-conscious for posting literally anything and everything that comes to his mind on his own instagram, which is why he made it private in the first place. 

Hongjoong had been looking for him, though. He had searched instagram for all the “Mingis” and had found the right one. Something about that makes Mingi feel special, and if there’s one thing he likes more than anything in the world, it’s to feel special. He approves Hongjoong’s request to follow him and immediately follows back. 

Nothing really happens after that, so he cranks the volume on his airpods and lets the A$AP Rocky spotify radio work its magic. 

After he finishes his readings he does text San and Wooyoung, though, because how the _fuck_ have they been keeping Hongjoong a secret from him this whole time? 

**Mingi:**

🧐how do u guys know my new crush 

[Screenshot attached] 

**San:**

bro HONGJOONG is ur crush? 

!!!!!!

**Wooyoung:**

kjNASJANSNjjfdsnkfdjnfsjsnkaHJNSKJN

MINGI

**Mingi:**

. 

**San:**

he was in my painting class last sem he’s a yr above us 

he’s really fucking good at art 

also now he works at that vegan place jongho loves ?

**Wooyoung:**

Ya and i know him because i went to san’s final crit for that class 

and we all got wine drun k together at da reception 😋

**Mingi:**

😭

**Wooyoung:**

small world baby

**Mingi:**

sanie u said he waas good at art

what kind of stuff.did he do. jw.

**San:**

oh mingi…..angel mingi 

hongjoong is prime crush material 

and ur in luck bc he’s exceptionally gay 

he did a lot of cool paintings in that class and was always DIYing his clothes and shit 

But are u in the headspace to receive information that might make u incredibly H word 

**Wooyoung:**

sanie don’t tell him he will break 

he is at capacity

**Mingi:**

BRO

TLELL ME

PLLEASE

I already see homgjoong in my dreams every other night nothing can hurt me

**San:**

_@hong.pokes_ on instagram

just look 

**Wooyoung:**

oh it’s over for him

**San:**

u think he’s not replying bc he got so h*rny that he died 

**Wooyoung:**

ye 😔

Mingi isn’t dead but he may as well be. He can say for sure that he certainly was not in the right headspace to receive this information at this tender moment in his young life— he’s only 20, he can’t even drink legally yet, he’s going to die a virgin, etc. etc. 

After the text San sent him, he had typed “hong.pokes” into the instagram search bar not quite knowing to expect. An art account maybe, or a finsta, nothing crazy. But Wooyoung was right, it’s absolutely over for him, because what he finds is Hongjoong’s fucking _tattoo instagram account_ , yeah, Hongjoong does stick and pokes and he posts pictures of them on this instagram account and he has three thousand folllowers, and Mingi is fucked, God, he’s so fucked. 

Mingi has been both incredibly frightened and incredibly turned on by tattoos since he can remember, honest to God— his big gay awakening occurred one day in middle school when he was home sick and accidentally watched an episode of Ink Master while his mom was at work. 

He’s always wanted a tattoo but he’s been too scared of the pain. And just thinking about Hongjoong’s quick and dexterous little black-nail-polished fingers gently pressing a needle into Mingi’s skin is enough to make him shiver all over, definitely in a horny way but also in a kind of terrified way, but that’s just Mingi’s perpetual state, horny and scared, so it’s not too big of a difference. 

He scrolls through the instagram page for what feels like hours. Hongjoong mostly seems to do delicate little designs— a bird in a cage, a little woman in a patterned dress, a pair of dice— but sometimes he does bigger stuff, and that’s where you can see his real art style coming through. It’s simple but somehow incredibly detailed, and Mingi can tell that Hongjoong has steady hands because the lines are clean and sharp. 

He has to put his phone away because it’s all just getting to be too much, and all he can think to do in this situation is to listen to Drake and try to figure out what love means, so that’s what he does, and it calms him down for a few hours. 

But then he makes the mistake of accidentally falling asleep, and of course his stupid horny lizard brain makes him have a super sexy dream with Hongjoong as the protagonist (or antagonist, depending on how you see it!). 

In the dream, Mingi is at a beach house of some sort. He’s not sure how he knows it’s a beach house, but he’s spread out on a California King with powder blue sheets and somehow he just knows that outside the window there are waves crashing against the shore. So yeah, he’s lying on this giant fucking bed playing Super Mario on a Nintendo DS lite for some reason— the kind that was really popular in like, 2007— and then he dies in the game and Hongjoong appears in the doorway, only he’s covered in tattoos and wearing a crop top. 

Dream-Mingi can see dream-Hongjoong’s bare torso and a little bit of his belly button, so obviously he’s rock hard at this point, and he tries to speak but whenever he opens his mouth it just sounds like T-Pain autotune (which honestly should kill his boner but it doesn’t and he’s definitely going to have to reckon with that when he wakes up). But then suddenly Hongjoong is on top of him and he’s licking and biting at his neck like a sexy cat and the autotune voice is gone so all Mingi can hear is the sound of his own stupid little breathless whines. 

The dream ends when Hongjoong finally speaks. All he says is “Mingi” but he breathes it directly into his ear and then kisses him straight on the lips and Mingi cums in the dream and in real life. 

Okay, embarrassing, but at least Mingi has his own room this year and doesn’t have to share with Yunho anymore. That doesn’t make him any less of a wet dream-having virgin, though, and Mingi vows right then and there that he will get fucked before the semester ends if it’s the last thing he does. 

Granted, he tells himself that every semester, but in his defense it’s honestly really hard being gay and terrified of everyone, so please cut him some slack. This time it’s gonna be the real deal, on God, no cap. 

On Friday, though, everything starts coming together. Which, in other words, means Mingi has done nothing for two days except experience yearning, longing, and pining to the most extreme degree, hoping with his entire tender gay heart that Hongjoong will instagram DM him out of the blue after he, Mingi, has done absolutely nothing to ensure such an outcome. But his technique (which Yunho calls “being a useless bottom”) proves effective that night, when Hongjoong heart reacts and replies to one of his instagram story mirror selfies. Score! 

**hj.kim**

😳😳😳😳MINGI….. u look so tall in this pic

how tall are u? 🧐

**mingi_song**

i haven’t been to the dr in a while but 6’ or 6’1...maybe 6’2 in big boots ? 😳

how tall are U…

**hj.kim**

5’7….. in big boots 🥴

**mingi_song**

wow!!!! i could fit u in my pocket

**hj.kim**

🤧🥴🥴🥴🥴

Mingi doesn’t know how to reply so he just “likes” the message in a panic and then throws his phone onto Yeosang and Wooyoung’s couch. It promptly bounces off onto the floor. 

“You’re gonna scratch the wood,” Wooyoung whines from the kitchen where he’s mixing drinks for their pregame. “The landlord’s not gonna give us the security deposit back.” 

“I think we kind of lost any hope of getting that back when you guys accidentally pushed Jongho through the wall,” Yeosang says lazily from the floor where he and San are playing “gay checkers” (which Mingi is pretty sure is just regular checkers played by gay people, but don’t quote him on that because he doesn’t really know how to play any type of checkers in the first place). 

“Not our fault he’s so sturdy,” Wooyoung huffs, coming into the room and handing out drinks. Mingi takes one (even though he knows for a fact that there’s red bull and tequila and lemonade in there) since they’re going to a party at one of San’s art friends’ houses later and meeting new people makes him nervous.

Mingi drinks a little bit more of the fucked up redbull lemonade drink, does a few vodka shots, lets Yunho rope him into a game of gay checkers, does another vodka shot, lets Wooyoung draw a star on his arm in sharpie, does one more shot (tequila this time), finishes his redbull lemonade drink, and then declares himself ready to go. 

The party is a short walk from Yeosang and Wooyoung’s apartment at some house in Allston, so Mingi isn’t even cold by the time they get there— which could also be due to the amount of alcohol in his system, but either way he feels great, ready to be the life of the party, all eyes on him, tallest boy in the room (except Yunho), fuck yeah! He’s already feeling pretty drunk, which means he’s also being a little more clingy than usual, which means he’s completely draped himself over Yunho’s back as they walk (with only a little difficulty) down the sidewalk. 

San’s already there when they go inside, and Wooyoung greets him with a little kiss and a “by the way, I’m mad at you” which Mingi can’t even begin to unpack, but after watching them interact as a couple for the many months that they’ve been dating he’s pretty sure that that’s just how they show affection, so he’s not worried. 

San introduces him and Yunho (seeing that Wooyoung and Yeosang have already wandered off somewhere and Jongho has been literally unreachable by phone all day, which happens sometimes) to his friend Johnny, who Mingi is displeased to realize is about a centimeter taller than he is. He recovers pretty quick though because Johnny ends up being cool, and if he ever gets invited back he’ll just wear boots next time. Then he gets introduced to a bunch of other hot, terrifying people who are all apparently into art or music or dance or something equally as intimidating. 

Soon enough he’s got a Mike’s Hard Lemonade in his hand (pink flavor, hell yeah) and is settled on the couch with Yunho and this guy named Mark Lee who Mingi knows vaguely from his writing seminar freshman year, except all he really remembers about Mark is that he came into class one morning wearing two different colored high top converse and had written his final paper about snowboarding (although that’s all Mingi really needs to know in order to respect him). 

They’re talking about the recent re-release of World of Warcraft Classic and Mingi is doing that thing he does when he gets drunk where he talks like he’s inside a fish tank when there’s suddenly a loud commotion from the other room near the front door, and Mingi can tell that someone new just entered, and before he can even take another sip of his Mike’s he realizes that he’d know that giant Macklemore coat anywhere. 

“Fuckkkk,” Mingi mumbles (hopefully) under his breath, and Mark Lee is just like, “woah, look at that guy,” to which Mingi replies “hhhhhh,” and then Yunho starts laughing super loud. 

“Holy shit, is that Mingi?” Hongjoong says, looking like a slinky little ocelot stalking its giant helpless prey and moving surprisingly fast for someone with such little legs. 

Mingi just stands, almost spilling his stupid drink, and yells, “Yup, it’s Mingi, hey!” 

Hongjoong puts his tiny hand on Mingi’s arm and laughs louder than he usually would, which makes Mingi think that he might be a little drunk too, which makes his brain go absolutely blurry. TV static. Microwave buzzing noise. “You know Johnny?” 

“Uh, not really, but I’m friends with San who’s friends with Johnny,” Mingi says, trying to control his volume and moving out of the way so someone else can take the seat he just vacated on the couch. Hongjoong leads him a little bit further away to a relatively empty corner, and Mingi shoots Yunho a look that probably doesn’t convey the full range of his emotions because he thinks he might be experiencing every single one of them all at once, but Yunho gives him a little thumbs up in return which makes him feel a little bit more okay. 

“You’re kidding! I love San,” Hongjoong says, grabbing onto his arm excitedly and making Mingi go no thoughts head empty. “We had a class together last year, he’s the cutest person alive, and I love his boyfriend too, Wooyoung, they’re so sweet together.” He takes a big breath, flushed. Before Mingi can even open his mouth to reply he beats him to it, saying “I’m so glad you’re here!” 

“Same,” Mingi says, hoping the darkness of the house masks how hard he’s blushing. “It’s funny how we have all these mutual friends.” 

“I know! I guess it’s, like, meant to be,” says Hongjoong, cocking his head slightly to the left, and all Mingi can focus on is the way the apples of his cheeks looks so defined when he smiles big like that.

Mingi just giggles. “Yeah.” He looks down at the Mike’s Pink Hard Lemonade in his sweaty hand. “Do you, uh, want a sip?” 

“That’s a big step, Mingi,” he says, baring his teeth playfully, probably without even realizing he’s doing it. His eyes are glinting like nothing Mingi’s ever seen before. “You don’t even know me that well. How can you be sure I don’t have cooties?” 

Mingi laughs nervously. “Even if you did. I don’t think I’d care.” 

So Hongjoong, with his eyes glinting sharp as ever, takes the bottle out of his hand and wraps his pink lips around it and takes a sip. Mingi watches the little muscles in his tan neck working as he swallows. His lips are wet after he pulls away. “Mmm,” he says, laughing. “Tastes like I’m fourteen again.” 

“Okay, shut up, it’s good,” Mingi says, taking the bottle out of his hands and taking his own sip. “I didn’t give it to you just so you could talk shit.” 

Hongjoong holds his hands up in surrender. “Sorry, I’m sorry,” he says, laughing. “It’s sweet. It’s good.” 

And then there’s a pause where Mingi’s looking at Hongjoong and Hongjoong’s looking at Mingi and for some reason the bluetooth speaker on the table is playing “Fastlove, Pt. 1” by George Michael. 

“It’s so fucking hot in here, Jesus,” Hongjoong says. And before Mingi can even nod in fervent agreement, Hongjoong is taking off his huge coat, and if Mingi thought he was hot before, well, he just didn’t know what hot really was back then, four seconds ago. He didn’t know back then that Hongjoong was going to be wearing a black crop top under that coat (dream come true, literally!) and that while he wasn’t exactly covered in the same tattoos Mingi had dreamed about, there are definitely a lot of tattoos there, and holy shit, how embarrassing would it be if Mingi popped a boner at San’s art friend Johnny’s house just from seeing Hongjoong’s belly button in the flesh, all while “Fastlove, Pt. 1” by George Michael was playing! Wow! 

“Wow,” Mingi can’t help but say. Hongjoong just laughs delightedly, but Mingi quickly corrects himself and adds: “your tattoos! So cool.” 

“Yeah?” Hongjoong asks, carefully draping his coat over the back of one of the chairs next to the table. “I did some of them myself,” he says, grinning. 

“No fucking way,” Mingi says, and he’s not even lying, because he knew Hongjoong did stick and pokes but he didn’t know he did them on _himself_ , too. Mingi winces at the thought, thinking about when he cried getting his flu shot last month. Hongjoong is without a doubt the coolest person he has ever met and knowing this makes Mingi’s stomach flip flop. 

“I do stick and pokes sometimes,” he says. 

“That’s really cool,” Mingi says, surprised at how chill he’s able to make himself appear when inside his brain a million tiny Mingis are throwing a million tiny tantrums. “Can I see one of the ones you did?” 

Hongjoong blushes (and Mingi maybe would have noticed if he hadn’t been so busy hoping that Hongjoong wasn’t noticing _him_ blushing!). He twists around his left arm, looking for something, until he finds it. “Aha! Okay, here you go. This one,” he says, pointing to a little pair of cowboy boots, complete with little star-shaped spurs, on the side of his forearm, “this one was one of the first ones I ever did. None of my friends would let me practice on them so I just did it on myself.” 

“It’s so good, though, holy shit!” Mingi says. “Did you just teach yourself, or?” 

“Yeah, I guess so,” Hongjoong says, the closest he’s ever been to sounding shy as long as Mingi’s known him. “I’ve always been drawing and stuff. But I’ve really wanted to be a tattoo artist ever since I was little. Freshman year I just picked up, like, a sewing needle and some ink and said fuck it.” 

Mingi’s eyes widen. “Woah… Sorry to sound like a broken record, but that’s so cool. I’ve always wanted to get a tattoo but I’ve been too scared. My pain tolerance is, like, nonexistent.” 

And just like that, any semblance of shyness that Hongjoong had potentially been at risk at exhibiting three minutes ago immediately disappears, the evil sparkle in his eyes returning with a vengeance. “Oh yeah? What would you get if you got one?” 

“I’m not sure,” Mingi says, going red again. “Something, uhh, cute and small probably.” 

“Cute and small, huh,” Hongjoong just says. Mingi wonders if Hongjoong realizes that “cute and small” describes him, too. “Would you let me give you one?” 

Hongjoong little hands. Mingi soft skin. Needle. Poke. Poke. Poke. Touch skin. Hands on skin. Mingi boner. 

Fuck, Mingi’s really not gonna be able to handle this conversation. “Um, I really mean it. About my pain tolerance. I’m a huge baby.” 

“I’d be gentle,” Hongjoong says, smiling small and sneaky. “I promise.” 

“Maybe,” Mingi finally chokes out, glad he at least still has the brain capacity to form and articulate words. “I have to think about it, but, um, maybe. I really do want one.” 

Hongjoong smiles huge this time, showing every single one of his teeth (there are so many!). “Okay, that’s all I need to hear. We can change the subject, just think about it. So, what even is your major?” 

They end up talking until Johnny kicks them out. San and Wooyoung are still there too, and so they all head out together, and at the intersection down the street San and Wooyoung keep walking with Mingi and Hongjoong even though Mingi knows for a fact Wooyoung lives in the other direction and that San is spending the night at his apartment. 

“Where are you going?” Mingi asks them, his voice tired and a little hoarse from it being literally three AM and from talking to Hongjoong all night. 

“Walking you home,” San says like it’s obvious. 

“I live, like, a forty minute walk away. You’re not walking me home, what’s wrong with you?” 

“Precisely why we need to… You never know who’s out there to take advantage of your innocence on a forty minute walk… trying to steal your ...like, virtue, or your wallet, or something,” Wooyoung mumbles, clearly the drunkest out of all of them, leaning on San. 

“Shut up,” Mingi says, rolling his eyes (but also blushing at the mention of his “virtue” and hoping Hongjoong is too tipsy to notice). “San, you need to take _him_ home. I’m fine, and he’s clearly the messiest out of all of us.” 

Hongjoong pipes up: “I can walk Mingi! I’m going that way anyway.” 

San interrupts, “Hongjoong, no offense but I’ve been to your apartment and you literally live right next to Ringer Park.” 

Now it’s Hongjoong’s turn to blush. “Okay, I never said I didn’t live in Allston. I simply said I was _going_ that direction anyway, which to your knowledge is completely true.” 

San rolls his eyes and shoots Mingi a pointed look that Mingi wishes he had the brain cells to decipher. “Mingi. Are you cool with Hongjoong walking you home?” 

“Yeah, of course, but I don’t need a babysitter,” he whines. 

“Of course you don’t,” San says, pulling Mingi to him for a hug and petting his head. “Good night, get back safe, text us when you’re home,” he says to Mingi, and then turns to Hongjoong: “Take care of him. He’s clumsy and he trips when the sidewalk gets uneven.” 

Hongjoong does a mock salute, says “Aye aye, Cap’n,” and then lets himself get hugged by San too. 

They say their goodbyes and then suddenly it’s just Hongjoong and Mingi alone in the dark, standing in the parking lot of the Super88 Chinese grocery store. 

“You don’t have to walk me home, seriously,” Mingi says. “I walk at night all the time.”

“I believe you,” Hongjoong says, looking pointedly straight at him. “But what if I said I wanted to walk with you because I like talking to you?” 

Mingi flushes. “Then I, like, couldn’t stop you, I guess.” 

“Cool. Lead the way.”

So Mingi leads the way, except after five minutes of that they decide that maybe it’s best for Hongjoong to walk in front because the sidewalk really is uneven and Mingi’s already tripped over his giant feet twice. 

“Maybe I should hold onto you,” Hongjoong says, eyes glinting mischievously even in the dark. And Mingi just shrugs, partly because he doesn’t want to sound eager but mostly because he’s physically incapable of responding to that with human speech. 

So Hongjoong grabs his arm, very obviously trying to avoid touching anything but his jacket sleeve, but that feels weird and awkward so Mingi shakes his arm out of his grip and, taking a deep breath, holds out his hand. 

Hongjoong takes it. 

“So, where do you live?” he asks. 

Mingi, still trying to regulate his breathing, doesn’t hear him. “Huh?”

“You live on campus, right?” 

“Oh, yeah,” Mingi says. “I live in a suite with my friend Yunho. He was the other tall guy at Johnny’s. Blue hair.” 

“Ahhh, yeah. I remember those days,” Hongjoong says fondly. He absently digs his nails lightly into Mingi’s palm, which might have hurt if he had done it a little harder, but instead just feels vaguely comforting. 

“I have my own room, though,” Mingi says. “So it’s not that bad.” 

They spend most of the walk talking about their roommates. Mingi has a _lot_ to say about Yunho, and literally all of it’s good, because he loves Yunho and thinks he’s just the funniest and smartest and coolest guy, and the best and most loyal friend, and how lucky was it that they were randomly assigned to be roommates freshman year, holy shit!

Hongjoong has more of a love-hate kind of relationship with his roommate, some guy named Seonghwa who had apparently been at the party tonight but clearly didn’t leave a lasting impression in Mingi’s Hongjoong-addled brain. 

“He’s just so, like, clean. All the fucking time,” Hongjoong complains, at this point having gotten used to Mingi’s fingers intertwined with his own and swinging their connected hands back and forth between them. “I love him, and we’re really best friends, and I’d kill for him, whatever, but sometimes just seeing the silhouette of his Swiffer WetJet makes me so angry my vision starts going red. You know?” 

They continue just like that, swinging their hands the whole way, until they finally reach the front of Mingi’s dorm after what feels like a few torturously-short minutes. 

“Thanks for walking with me,” Mingi says, finally breaking his hand free of Hongjoong’s as much as it pains him to do. “Even though you seriously didn’t have to.” 

“Thanks for letting me walk with you,” Hongjoong says, grinning. “Maybe I’ll get to babysit you again sometime soon.” 

Mingi goes bright red. “Shut up, oh my God. I’m seriously 20 years old.” 

“Never too old to get babysat,” says Hongjoong, laughing and looking particularly feline in the light from the lamps in front of Mingi’s building. 

Then there’s a brief silence where Mingi’s looking at Hongjoong and Hongjoong’s looking at Mingi, which reminds Mingi of when a similar thing happened earlier at the party, only now instead of hearing George Michael’s “Fastlove, Pt. 1” in the background, all he can hear is the hum of the streetlights and the occasional gentle woosh of a car passing by. 

Mingi breaks the silence, because he’s stepping (more like stomping, or somersaulting) out of his comfort zone tonight, and so why not. “You can, you know, like, sleep over. If you want. So you don’t have to go all the way back to Allston.” 

Hongjoong just sighs and looks at Mingi like he’s something precious. “Would I need an ID for you to sign me in?” 

“Uh, yeah, I’m pretty sure.” 

“I don’t have my ID with me.” 

Mingi can’t help but laugh. “Fuck, dude. Why not?” 

“My license picture is ugly, don’t ask,” he sighs dramatically. “I only carry it when I need to, and I wasn’t expecting to need it when I left the house tonight to go to a party literally a block away.”

Mingi frowns, and it definitely could be considered a pout, which makes Hongjoong giggle in delight, which just makes Mingi frown (pout) even more.

“I’ll uber back,” Hongjoong says. 

“Can I at least, like, pay for it?” 

“Nope!” 

Mingi frowns (pouts) again. “Can you at least text me when you get home?” he asks. 

“I don’t have your number, dummy,” Hongjoong says, expectantly. 

“Well, um,” Mingi says. “Do you want it?” 

They switch phones, and when Hongjoong is gone Mingi checks his new contact and finds that Hongjoong had put his name followed by three emojis: the baby angel, the strawberry, and the evil eye. 

After that he lies in bed for a while, thinking about love and wondering what getting a tattoo would feel like. He falls asleep only after he confirms Hongjoong’s gotten home safe. 

The next morning he wakes up to 96 text messages. Not from Hongjoong (sadly), but rather because San had added Hongjoong and Seonghwa (who had apparently been a big hit with all Mingi’s friends at the party last night) to their groupchat. He skims through the conversation— something about Yunho and Jongho needing to borrow $100 for a “business venture”— and then checks his other messages. There’s one from San last night saying he and Wooyoung got home safe, one from his mom which is just a picture of his dog in a pumpkin costume (he smashes the heart react on that one), and finally one from Hongjoong this morning. 

**hongjoong 👼🏻🍓🧿**

mingi!!! 

i don’t know if ur sick of me yet 

but i’m doing this huge mural type thing today that involves throwing paint onto a very large canvas

very little technical skill is involved 

was wondering if u would wanna come help?? 

If u don’t mind getting messy 😌

**mingi song**

aaaaaaa im not sick of u At all ! that sounds dope!

R u sure tho? 

i really have no art skills 

this isn’t for a grade is it

**hongjoong 👼🏻🍓🧿**

dw honey! it’s seriously just supposed to be paint all over a canvas 

think jackson pollock but cuter and more gay

it’s just gonna be used as part of the set for some play so don’t stress! 

meet me in the arts building at 1? 

**mingi song**

ok!!!!! If ur sure!!!!!!!

**hongjoong 👼🏻🍓🧿**

wear something u don’t mind getting ruined 🤠

Mingi wants to reply with something like “I hope my outfit isn’t the only thing that’s going to get ruined today” but that’s not really his style, because he prefers a more subtle approach (and by that he just means that he prefers cowering in fear and simply hoping his natural charm is enough to get the job done). 

He rolls out of bed like a lincoln log and agonizes over what to wear for a few minutes, before finally deciding on an old pair of black jeans that he kind of grew out of in high school (when he joined the soccer team and started making some serious gains in the leg muscle department) and are tight enough to make his thighs look relatively irresistible, in his opinion. Then he puts on a t-shirt that’s faded from being washed too many times, but gets scared of being cold and so he puts on a big hoodie over that, and then puts his big puffy jacket over all of it. 

He looks at himself in the mirror, pouts experimentally, and then deems himself appropriate. On his way out he notices that Yunho’s door is closed, which means he’s probably out somewhere, so Mingi sends him a quick “hanging out 1on 1 w hongjoong today 😳” text before he leaves. Then he bops to the dining hall for another epic self-made waffle (with sprinkles this time, also stolen from the ice cream station) on his way to the arts building and makes it there by 1:03 (new personal record!). 

He texts Hongjoong telling him that he’s here on the first floor, looking around and feeling vaguely out of place while he waits. Hongjoong comes to get him pretty quick though, so he doesn’t have much time to feel awkward about not belonging because he’s too busy ogling Hongjoong’s lithe little body which is currently clad in a black t-shirt and a pair of overalls that are cuffed at the ankles about a billion times. 

“Hey!” Hongjoong says, and then suddenly he’s crowding Mingi’s personal space and wrapping him up in a little hug. He looks smaller than usual, and that’s when Mingi notices that he’s barefoot, his little paint-splattered feet just out there in the open, oof. 

“Hey,” Mingi says, nervous around Hongjoong again now that he’s sober. 

“So, don’t be mad, but I started a little bit without you, I just couldn’t help it,” he says, grinning, and Mingi has never seen Hongjoong looking more “electric billboard with a million individual LED bulbs” than at this very moment. 

“I’m not mad,” Mingi just says and lets Hongjoong lead him to the elevator. 

“Okay, good,” Hongjoong says, pressing the button for the 6th floor. “You’re gonna get to see my little studio.” 

And then the elevator stops, and they get out and Hongjoong leads them down the hall and around a corner and into a room that Mingi assumes is the aforementioned studio because there’s a huge canvas on the tarp-covered floor with some paint splatters on it. Mingi thinks it’s already looking very “abstract impressionist” if he says so himself, and yes, he googled Jackson Pollock earlier this morning and read about a third of his Wikipedia page so he knows what he’s talking about. 

“Woah,” Mingi says, looking around. “Is this where you do all your stuff?” 

“Nah, only the stuff for school mainly,” Hongjoong says, busily prying open a can of paint with a little wooden thing. “Or when I need a really big space.” 

Mingi hums a little bit. “You know I used to be really good at finger painting when I was little.”

“Yeah?” Hongjoong looks up from his paint can, laughing. 

“Yeah. My mom still has all my stuff from elementary school framed.” 

“That’s _so_ cute,” Hongjoong coos. “I think you’ll be good at this, then. Take off your shoes.” 

Mingi just holds his breath and forces himself _not_ to pop a boner at the sound of Hongjoong telling him what to do. He takes off his shoes. 

He’s kind of shy about just throwing paint everywhere at first, though, because it’s not a very intuitive thing for him to do. He’s not used to letting go to this extent. Sure he can be loud and messy and wiggly a lot of the time, and sometimes when he dances he can kind of forget that he’s anxious about literally everything in the world, but in general there’s a lot that Mingi keeps bottled up. 

He’s spent most of his life feeling like everything is wound up inside him so tight that he can barely breathe, so when Hongjoong tells him to “just throw it,” he doesn’t exactly know how to do that. 

“What do you mean just throw it?” Mingi asks, breathless without having even done any physical activity yet. “I don’t know where to aim.” 

Hongjoong just looks at Mingi like he’s a hermit crab, like he wants to pry his fleshy little insides out of his too-small shell and put him inside of a nicer one, a better one, one that fits. 

“You’re not supposed to aim.” 

“I don’t want to fuck it up for you.” 

“You couldn’t do that even if you wanted to.” 

“I’m nervous.” 

“Mingi, it’s paint.” 

And then out of nowhere, Hongjoong kicks over the can of paint closest to the canvas, really hard. The dark blue pigment sloshes out, and while half of it just oozes onto the tarp, a lot of it gets caught on the canvas too, and Mingi isn’t an artist but he thinks it looks fine. 

“See?” Hongjoong says, a frenzied little glint in his eyes. “It doesn’t matter.” 

Mingi dips his paintbrush into one of the remaining paint cans, watching the excess drip down onto the tarp below. 

“Just throw it!” 

And so Mingi closes his eyes and throws it— throws everything, including the paintbrush— as hard as he can. And with his eyes still scrunched tightly he hears the thump of the brush on the canvas, and then the clatter of the brush hitting the floor as it bounces off, and most importantly he hears Hongjoong’s delighted laugh and then the unmistakable clapping of hands. 

“Fuck! Yes, Mingi!” Hongjoong says, and Mingi opens his eyes and sees him. He’s clapping his hands in excitement and the size of the smile on his face makes Mingi feel woozy. 

He looks at the canvas to see the splatter he made, and thinks it looks fine. He feels his heart beating in his ribcage, and he thinks that if he concentrates hard then he could hear Hongjoong’s too. 

“Feel good?” Hongjoong asks. 

“Yeah,” Mingi says, breathing in and out, and feeling each breath. 

They spend the rest of the afternoon like that, breathing hard and laughing loud. At some point Hongjoong puts on one of his playlists and Mingi can’t understand any of the songs because they’re all in French but he does think that “vibes” are universal so he really doesn’t mind at all. 

By the end of it they’re sitting, just sort of lazily tossing paint onto where they’ve already been tossing paint for the past few hours. 

“I’m hungry,” Hongjoong declares, throwing his paintbrush onto the canvas not unlike the way Mingi had done earlier in his fit of revelatory passion. “Wanna postmates something?” 

Mingi’s always hungry and he always wants to postmates something, so they end up getting Thai and sharing it on the floor of the studio surrounded by paint splatters and loose newspaper. 

“Does your mom really have your finger paintings framed?” Hongjoong asks in between bites of his tofu pad see ew. 

“No,” Mingi says, laughing. “I lied. She does have some on the fridge though.” 

“I wanna see them. I bet they’re good.” 

“Oh, here’s a funny story,” Mingi says, unable to stop himself now. “When my dad left, he actually took one of them off the fridge without telling my mom, and like, some of my brother’s stuff too, and she was so mad. Like, way more mad at the fact that he took our elementary school art projects than at the fact that he actually left.” 

If Hongjoong is surprised by Mingi’s suddenly sharing a vulnerable childhood moment, he does a good job of hiding it. He just says: “Yo, that’s mega fucked. I’m sorry. Do we like him, or no?” 

“Who, my dad?” 

“Yeah.” 

“Hmm, not sure. I haven’t really talked to him since like first grade.” 

“Oh, shit.” 

“Yeah, I used to just, like, tell people I didn’t have one.” 

Hongjoong inches a little closer to Mingi on the floor so that their knees are almost touching. “I’m sorry.” 

Mingi cringes. “No nooo no, don’t be, seriously. The reason I tell people about this so casually is because it’s actually seriously just a funny story to me. Don’t be sorry.” 

“You know, I also don’t have one. A dad.” 

“Oh word! High five,” Mingi says, holding up his hand for Hongjoong to hit. “What happened?”

Hongjoong hits his hand softly and laughs. “Nothing happened. I just have two moms.” 

Mingi’s eyes widen. The mullet, the veganism. It all makes sense. “That genuinely explains so much about you.” 

Hongjoong laughs, eyes sparkling. “I actually get that a lot.” 

“So were you like….. sperm donated?” 

“Yup!” 

“That’s dope.” 

The next week Mingi doesn’t see much of Hongjoong because they’re both so busy with classes, and Mingi has dance practice and Hongjoong has work, and Hongjoong lives off campus so he doesn’t even have a dining plan, which means they can’t even eat lunch together sometimes. They text pretty regularly though, and under any normal circumstances Mingi would be fairly convinced that they’re flirting. 

But these are far from normal circumstances, and Hongjoong is so far from normal, so far from being like anyone he’s ever met. If Mingi was in this situation with any other boy he’d be totally able to gauge if the boy was into him or not, but Hongjoong is so weird and different that Mingi isn’t sure if he’s just like this with everyone he meets. 

They do finally get to hang out that weekend, though. Hongjoong invites him over to his apartment so they can watch this scary movie he’d been telling Mingi about where Megan Fox apparently kills a bunch of high school boys and then makes out with Amanda Seyfried. 

“I can’t believe you’ve never seen Jennifer’s Body before,” Hongjoong says, jumping onto his bed, propping himself up against one of the many pillows and patting the spot next to him for Mingi. “It’s a cult classic.” 

Mingi gingerly sits next to him on the bed, feeling very hot and dehydrated all of the sudden. “I really don’t watch horror movies. Like, ever.” 

“Aw,” Hongjoong says, grabbing his laptop and propping it up on Mingi’s knees. “Scared?” 

“No,” Mingi says, and he knows that both of them know he’s lying. “I’ve never been scared in my life.” 

“Okay. Don’t expect me to comfort you during the gory parts then,” Hongjoong says, grinning. 

Hongjoong reaches over Mingi to turn his lamp off, and when he’s done, instead of putting his arm back where it belongs, he just leaves it there to rest a little bit above Mingi’s shoulders. It shouldn’t technically work because Mingi is so much taller, but he’s all slouched down and curled up and so Hongjoong ends up being a little bit above him. 

His breath hitches just enough to be barely noticeable and Hongjoong looks at him and asks, “This ok?” 

Mingi just nods and feels so dizzy, and he may be a virgin but he’s been on dates before and he knows that nothing he’s ever experienced can compare to how Hongjoong is making him feel right now just from a light touch to his shoulders. 

The movie ends up being so fucking scary, which reminds Mingi why he never watches horror movies, and he’s watching with his eyes scrunched up and his hands covering his face while Hongjoong just laughs and eats chips. Jennifer is killing so many of these boys, and there’s so much blood on the screen, truly an unnecessary amount, Mingi thinks, and then he wonders what the budget for this movie even was, and then, oh, Mingi suddenly blushes because Jennifer is now kissing Amanda Seyfried’s character (he forgets her name) super intensely with a whole lot of tongue! 

Those girls sure are going for it, he thinks, and after a few minutes he just starts staring at the wall of Hongjoong’s bedroom instead of at the screen because he respects women. And in fact he’s so busy looking at the wall that he misses Hongjoong glancing directly at him, and then quickly averting his eyes, and then glancing back again. 

By the time the movie’s over Mingi is shaking. It wasn’t the scariest movie he’s ever seen (it was honestly kind of good, and he totally understands why gays love it) but there was still a lot of violence and killing and bleeding, too much for Mingi’s delicate sensibilities. 

Mingi suddenly realizes that over the course of the past two hours he’s somehow curled down even smaller, and that without even noticing it his head had somehow moved and is now basically resting on Hongjoong’s shoulder. Oops! He considers moving but he’s very comfy here and so he tells himself that if Hongjoong wasn’t chill with this, he’d tell him right? 

“Okay… was that a bad idea to watch?” Hongjoong asks, looking at Mingi with a hint of concern and leaning over him again to put his laptop on the little table next to his bed. 

“No, no no,” Mingi says. “I wasn’t scared.” 

“Oh, you weren’t?” 

“Nope. I don’t get scared.” 

“That’s good to know.” 

“Yup.” 

“Why are you shaking then?” 

Mingi fees his face grow hot. “Cold in here.” 

“Oh, I can turn up the heater if you want?” Hongjoong says, smiling evilly. 

The reality is actually that Mingi’s super fucking warm from being in Hongjoong’s bed and from sharing body heat for the past two hours so he kinda fucked himself with that one, but then again he’s also pretty sure that neither of them had been convinced by his lie in the first place. 

“Okay, maybe it was a little scary. I made it through, though.”

“Yeah, you were a little trooper. I’m proud of you. Did you like it at least?

Mingi makes an indecipherable gurgling noise in the back of his throat at the thought of Hongjoong being proud of him, but manages to respond. “Fuck yeah, it was really good. It was funny, too, which was cool.” 

“Thank God,” Hongjoong says, shifting around a little bit but making sure Mingi doesn’t stop touching him. At this point they’ve both almost sunk down completely onto the bed so that they’re lying down, facing each other. “I was afraid you wouldn’t and then I’d have to rethink this whole thing.” 

Mingi flushes, and doesn’t know what to say, so he just looks at Hongjoong, and Hongjoong looks back, which makes him nervous and causes him to look away. Their faces are suddenly so close. It would be so easy to bridge the gap. 

“Mingi, can I ask you something?”

Mingi just nods, yes, you can ask me anything, you can literally have anything you want, take it, anything, I promise I’ll give it to you, etc, etc. 

“You’re super hard to read,” he just says. 

“That wasn’t a question.” 

“Yeah, I didn’t know what to ask, exactly. Sorry. I just don’t know what’s going on in your head sometimes.” 

“My head?” Mingi says, frowning. “Nothing going on in here. No thoughts. Head empty.” 

Hongjoong laughs fondly. “Shut up, I’m serious,” he says. “I just… don’t know what you want. To be honest.” 

Mingi gulps, because here it is, the moment has come, he finally has to reckon with his shit communication skills and Hongjoong’s going to have to let him down easy. It was nice while it lasted. “What do you mean?” 

“Sometimes… I think that you really like me, and we’ll have this insane flirty banter and it definitely feels like a two-sided thing, but then, like, other times, you won’t even look at me.” Hongjoong pauses, gnawing on the inside of his lip like he’s debating something very hard, and Mingi thinks this is the most human he’s ever seen him. He hesitates before saying, “I like you a lot.” 

If Mingi thought he was no thoughts head empty before, he doesn’t even know what he is right now. His brain is just yelling “MANY THOUGHTS, HEAD FULL” at maximum intensity and the million tiny Mingis inside of him are all singing “Emotions” by Mariah Carey but at different volumes and tempos. “You _what_?” 

“Mingi, I’m super into you,” Hongjoong says, laughing like it’s been obvious the whole time! “I have this huge crush on you, I’m obsessed with you. Have I not been making that clear enough?” 

And at that exact moment, all the little Mingis inside of big Mingi sync up and do Mariah’s whistle note. 

“Oh!” Mingi just says. “I didn’t know.” 

“Seriously?” 

“The things I, like, dream about about don’t actually happen that often.” 

“The things you what?” 

“I don’t know,” Mingi says, blushing. “I just try not to ever get my hopes up.” 

“Mingi, what are you trying to say?” Hongjoong asks, a little smile beginning to tug at the corners of his lips. “You don’t have to be scared to say anything around me.” 

Mingi’s cheeks are absolutely crimson at this point. “I, just,” he says, averting his eyes. “I like you too, obviously. It’s insane how much I think about you. I’m sorry I didn’t make it more clear. I’m a little terrified.” 

Hongjoong’s face erupts into a full-blown blinding grin. “God, Mingi!” he says, laughing. He opens his mouth to say something but then just starts laughing again. “Fuck, Mingi.” 

Silence, and then Hongjoong laughs one more time, and then asks: “Can I _please_ kiss you?” 

And Mingi scrunches his eyes closed tight because this is _so_ embarrassing. Acknowledging that he wants something, allowing himself to want it, being vulnerable in front of another person in such a real way, having to surrender to the mortifying ordeal of being known. 

But he nods. He nods and nods and nods and he can’t stop nodding. 

And then Hongjoong’s lips are on his own. 

Hongjoong tastes like chips and kisses like the world’s ending, like it’s his last minute on earth and out of all the places he could have chosen to spend it he’s decided on Mingi’s lips and in his mouth and around his tongue. He tangles his strong little hand in Mingi’s hair, and Mingi’s been kissed before but never by Hongjoong and he doesn’t know what to do with his hands. 

Luckily, Hongjoong does, and he grabs one of Mingi’s arms and puts it on him, his body, which is warm and cool and soft and hard at the same time, and Mingi thinks that he’s so lucky to be here, touching it, touching him. Hongjoong pulls Mingi’s hair, just hard enough to make him let out a tiny little moan. 

But then like that he’s pulling away, and then they’re both just lying there against each other, breathing shaky. 

“Mingi, Mingi, Mingi,” Hongjoong breathes, leaning the top of his head against Mingi’s cheek. 

“Hongjoong,” Mingi says, voice cracking a little bit on the second syllable. He laughs, and then Hongjoong laughs. 

Hongjoong looks like he’s about to say something, but decides against it, instead leaning up and capturing Mingi’s lips with his own again. 

They kiss and they kiss and they kiss, just learning about each other, running their hands up and down each other’s bodies and tangling their hands in each other’s hair and transferring saliva the good old fashioned way. After a few minutes, Mingi’s a little bit hard in his jeans, but he doesn’t have plans to do anything about it, obviously, until Hongjoong shifts their positions so he’s on top, straddling him. 

“Fuck, Mingi,” Hongjoong breathes, biting Mingi’s bottom lip hard enough to make him squirm a little bit. “Wanted to see you like this since the first time I— saw you.” 

“Yeah?” Mingi mumbles into Hongjoong’s mouth, his mind already so fuzzy that it’s a little hard to think of words, but he’s trying, his head is just so full of Hongjoong and he’s not used to being kissed dizzy like this. 

“Baby, baby,” Hongjoong just says, pressing quick kisses against Mingi’s jawline and neck. “Why do you think I sat across from you in the library that whole night? You were so pretty. I just wanted to look at you some more.” And then he does something crazy, something absolutely unhinged— he rolls his quick little hips down into Mingi’s, and Mingi can feel him through both layers of fabric. 

Hongjoong apparently loves to talk, which is great for them both because Mingi loves to hear his raspy, bossy little voice in his ear, but it’s honestly making him so hot that he’s worried he might cum in his pants if he doesn’t stop soon, and that’s not really how he wants this whole thing to go. But Mingi finds it hard to speak up in situations like these, not that he’s been in too many, but still, his brain gets so clogged up that he can’t focus on anything but Hongjoong’s hands on his chest and in his hair and ghosting over his jawbone. 

“Do you want me to touch you?” Hongjoong whispers, fingers traveling down and down and down until they’re resting lightly on the outline of Mingi’s dick. He flinches and wiggles around at the contact. 

“Yeah,” Mingi just says, and his legs are beginning to shake a little either from nerves or excitement or adrenaline or all of the above. “If you want to.”

Hongjoong’s eyes crinkle up and he grins a grin that’s somehow both sweet and sinful at the same time. “I wanna make you feel so good,” he says, nipping at his lower lip again and then licking into his mouth and making everything feel so filthy. “What do you like? What are you into?” 

“I don’t really,” Mingi begins, a shadow of a blush spreading over his cheekbones. “I don’t really know. I’ve never really done this.” 

“Oh!” Hongjoong says, and Mingi can see the gears in his brain working as he formulates a new strategy, a different plan of attack. “So no one’s ever touched you?” 

“I got a handjob from my senior prom date in high school, but I barely, like, count that. It was just kind of traumatizing because I was super closeted and had to imagine Jake Gyllenhaal to finish.” 

“Oh, baby,” Hongjoong murmurs, kissing him softly and sweetly. “Mingi. I’ll be so good to you, I promise.” And then he kisses him deep and rolls his hips again, and again. “Can I take these off?” he asks, rubbing his hands up and down Mingi’s strong thighs. Mingi just nods fervently.

Grinning again, Hongjoong slinks further down the bed, quickly unbuttoning Mingi’s jeans and pulling them down his thighs slowly, taking every possible second to savor the smoothness of Mingi’s bare skin underneath his fingertips. Then he finally pulls them all the way off, leaving Mingi in just his boxer briefs. He shivers slightly at the breeze from Hongjoong’s ceiling fan. “Your thighs, Mingi, God, wanna,” Hongjoong says, shaking his head and running his hands up and down Mingi’s legs, “I don’t even know. You’re so hot, I can’t believe no one’s ever gotten to do this for you before. ‘M so lucky.” 

And then before Mingi can even let out a whine, Hongjoong’s pulling down his underwear and wrapping his hand around his dick. Mingi squirms, letting out a series of little “ah ah ah”s, to which Hongjoong asks: “this okay?” 

“Yes, God, yeah,” Mingi breathes, reaching out both his hands for Hongjoong, who has no other choice than to let himself be dragged up to kiss him. It takes a little bit of maneuvering because Hongjoong is so much smaller, but they finally work out a position where Hongjoong is able to give Mingi everything he wants— he can keep his little hand pumping steadily up and down Mingi’s dick while also kissing him, wet and dirty and messy. 

While Mingi had been trying to hold back his whines earlier when they had just been kissing, all of that’s been thrown to the wind with Hongjoong’s hand on his cock and his tongue in his mouth. He’s moaning and whining against Hongjoong’s lips and Hongjoong’s just swallowing it all down, giving him everything and more, and Mingi’s not sure he’s going to last much longer. 

Hongjoong pulls away to whisper more sweet and dirty things in his ear, “God, Mingi, you’re so sweet, so pretty and good for me. I want you to cum just like this when you’re ready, okay?” 

“Okay, okay, okay,” Mingi whines, his mouth open because it’s all just too much, and Jake Gyllenhaal is literally the farthest thing from his mind right now. “I’m close, I think I’m close.” 

“What do you need, baby, tell me,” Hongjoong asks softly, hand moving faster on Mingi’s wet cock. 

“Mmm, just keep touching me,” Mingi panting. “Keep talking to me.” 

Hongjoong smiles, giddy. “Okay, I can do that,” he says. “You’re doing so well, Mingi, fuck, just knowing I’m the first boy to touch you makes me so hot. All that cock, and it’s all for me, no one else, all mine. So pretty. Been thinking about this for so long, getting you under me like this, all squirmy and helpless, fuck, Mingi, there’s something so special about you.” 

That’s what does it, and Mingi goes “Fuck, Hongjoong, I’m gonna cum,” and Hongjoong pushes up his shirt past his nipples so he doesn’t ruin it, and then he’s letting go and cumming all over his tummy and Hongjoong is stroking him through it and kissing him so dizzy and senseless. 

It takes a second for Mingi to come back from that, panting and twitching right there on Hongjoong’s bed. Hongjoong’s already grabbing tissues from his desk, and gently offering them to him by the time he’s returned to reality. “Rhrhgg,” Mingi says, and wipes himself down weakly. “You?” 

“What?” Hongjoong asks, looking at him with an amused little smile. 

“Your turn?” Mingi just says sleepily, hand lightly ghosting over the bulge in Hongjoong’s vintage Wranglers. 

“You don’t have to, I know that was probably a lot,” Hongjoong says, but Mingi is already pushing Hongjoong into the spot on the bed that he himself just vacated and wrestling with the button of his jeans. 

“Ahh!” Hongjoong says, eyes fluttering shut involuntarily as Mingi’s big giant yaoi hand wraps around his dick through his boxer briefs. 

“I, uhhh, haven’t done this to anyone before, so don’t hate me,” Mingi says, already flushed from the handjob he just got but going even redder after his admission. 

“Mingi, stop it,” Hongjoong commands, pushing his underwear down and kicking it off his legs and then gently guiding Mingi’s hand around his leaking cock. “You’re— seriously perfect. Just touch me like you touch yourself.” 

So Mingi does, he focuses really hard and thinks about what he likes and tries to do that to Hongjoong, even though it’s really hard to concentrate because Hongjoong has a fair amount of tattoos on his thighs too and he wants to stop and figure out what each of them is supposed to be. 

“Kiss me,” Hongjoong instructs, and Mingi forgets about the tattoos (for now), springing up to kiss him nice and sloppy with his hand still stroking him up and down. 

“Your hand looks so fucking big on my cock,” Hongjoong pants into Mingi’s neck and then bites him a little bit. “God.” 

Mingi just can’t believe he’s here giving Hongjoong Kim a fucking handjob, and he seriously must have been Mother fucking Teresa in his past life or something, but then he remembers hearing something about how Mother Theresa was actually not as good as everyone claims she was so he takes that back, umm, he must have been, like, Florence Nightingale (he hopes she’s not problematic!) or someone who was really, really good in his past life to deserve this. 

He must be doing something right because Hongjoong’s breath is becoming shallower and shorter and his eyes are half-lidded and he generally just looks sexy as shit. Randomly Mingi does some twisty thing with his wrist, and then suddenly Hongjoong is grabbing his hand (the one that’s not around his dick) and interlacing their fingers together and going “fuck, fuck, Mingi, that’s it, just like that, baby, I’m gonna cum,” so Mingi keeps doing what he’s doing and then Hongjoong cums all over his hand. Dope!

“Kiss,” Hongjoong says, and Mingi doesn’t even bother to wipe off his hand before leaning in to kiss him sloppily, but then Hongjoong shakes him off a little bit to grab the tissues and they clean up. 

“Jesus Christ, Mingi,” Hongjoong says, still breathing hard as he lies back down on the bed and pulls Mingi down with him. He’s stronger than he looks, Mingi notes, as he maneuvers them both around so he’s sort of lying on top of Mingi’s chest. He wonders if Hongjoong can feel how fast his heart is beating. 

“Was that okay?” Mingi asks, debating whether or not to put his hand on Hongjoong’s back. He lifts his hand, hesitates, puts his hand back down, and then says fuck it, lifts it back up and puts it on Hongjoong, who just makes an honest-to-god purring (?) noise so he thinks he did the right thing. 

“Mingi, yes, oh my God,” Hongjoong says. “I was not expecting that to happen today.” 

“Me neither,” Mingi says, taking a deep, deep breath. “Wow.” 

“Do you wanna try dating? Would you be… interested in that?” 

“Dating… like, being boyfriends? Or like, just sex stuff.” 

“Boyfriends,” Hongjoong murmurs softly. “If you’re interested in that. I really like you.” 

“You want to be boyfriends?” 

“Mingi, yes! You’re going to have to start believing the things I tell you.”

Mingi blushes. “Sorry. Yes. I want that. Like crazy.” 

Hongjoong laughs. Mingi laughs. The high tone of Hongjoong’s laugh complements the low tone of Mingi’s in a way that’s almost musical, and Mingi thinks it sounds good. They sound good together. 

Mingi ends up spending the night, and the next morning he leaves with three brand-new hickeys and a boyfriend. 

Unfortunately, though, later that day he’s at the dining hall and he runs into Jongho, who immediately clocks the red and purple marks on Mingi’s neck and exposes him in the entire groupchat, who then promptly roast him beyond his wildest imaginations. But then Hongjoong just replies “sorry fellas! next time i’ll put them somewhere more hidden 😌” which really gets them going, and Mingi can’t do anything other than just sit there and blush about it. 

The next week of Mingi’s newly-cuffed life is relatively similar to his old one prior to the cuffing, except that now he can hold Hongjoong’s little hand when they go places together and let the fur from his coat tickle his arm when he does it. He and Hongjoong still are so busy that they don’t see each other as much as they’d like to, but they find time to hang out as much as they can (and on Wednesday, Hongjoong even drags Mingi behind the Arts building where the dumpsters are and kisses him silly, so everything is going fine as far as he’s concerned!). 

On Saturday they go to this crazy food court with a bunch of different options— Mingi gets bibimbap (with no meat for Hongjoong’s sake) and Hongjoong gets some insane spicy soup that Mingi’s afraid of even though Hongjoong tries more than once to feed it to him. They sit in the very back corner next to the coin-operated claw machine, and after they finish eating Mingi wins Hongjoong a stuffed octopus. 

And as they’re walking hand-in-hand back to Hongjoong’s apartment, Mingi thinks that it is so simple to be here. He wonders why he ever thought it wouldn’t be. 

After getting to Hongjoong’s and chatting with Seonghwa for a few minutes, they go to his room under the pretense that they’re gonna “watch” “The Sopranos” but they only make it through about a third of an episode before both their shirts are off. 

As Mingi’s mouth ghosts over the black ink on Hongjoong’s collarbone, he wonders absently about the origin stories of Hongjoong’s tattoos. Since the party a few weeks ago, he hasn’t been able to get the thought of getting one of his own out of his head. And now that he and Hongjoong are officially a couple, an item, _boyfriends_ , the thought is even more tempting. He trusts Hongjoong. 

He pulls his mouth away, realizing he’s left a small but dark red bruise right above the little snake on Hongjoong’s collarbone. “When did you get this one?” Mingi breathes into his chest, resting his head on Hongjoong’s bare skin. 

“The snake?” 

“Mmmm.” 

“I got it last year. On my birthday. Do you not like it?” 

“No! I love it. It looks so cool.” 

“You know it’s never too late to ask for one. I’d drop everything to stick a needle in you,” Hongjoong says playfully, eyes glinting. Mingi buries his head into Hongjoong’s chest. 

“I think I do. Want one,” he says, muffled. 

“What’s that, Mingi? Did I hear what I think I heard?” 

Mingi raises his head slightly. “I do want you to give me a tattoo.” 

Hongjoong’s eyes light up like Christmas came early. “Oh my God, finally he says it.” He springs up so he’s sitting against the headboard (meanwhile, Mingi falls). “What do you want? Where do you want it? How big are we talking? God, Mingi, you’re gonna look so hot.” 

Mingi just blushes, because what’s he even supposed to say to that! “Um. Probably something small. I wanna think about it for a little and then let you know. Is that cool?”

“Of course that’s cool. I’m in no rush. I can draw you up some stuff if you’re not sure, or yeah, just let me know!” Hongjoong says excitedly. “Wow. I’m so excited. I can’t wait to get my hands on you.” 

“You can get your hands on me now,” Mingi says, grabbing Hongjoong’s hand and placing it on his own bare chest. And then he just grins, waiting to be praised. 

And praise him he does. 

The next couple of weeks pass, and they both go to their respective homes for Thanksgiving break. Hongjoong had invited Mingi to his house in San Diego to do Thanksgiving with his moms and his sister, but there’s no way in hell Mingi could have afforded that plane ticket and plus, his own mother would have never forgiven him. 

So he goes home to Ridgefield and sees his mom and brother and their dog, and it feels good, but he misses Hongjoong and he’s not sure if he’s allowed to. At one point, when his whole family is sitting around the table, he’s texting Hongjoong and his grandmother zeroes in on him, exclaiming in Korean: “ _Mingi-yah! What is on that phone that’s more important than your own family?_ ” At that, he blushes deep red and mumbles “ _nothing, sorry_ ” and all his cousins laugh. He tells Hongjoong about it later that night on Facetime, and he laughs too. 

They also talk a little bit in Korean that night. While Mingi is pretty fluent, having grown up in a predominantly Korean area, with his mom and relatives speaking the language to him throughout his whole life, Hongjoong is considerably less so (although he’s good-natured about it).

“Only one of my moms is Korean,” Hongjoong explains. Mingi can see the background of Hongjoong’s childhood bedroom from the limited view that the iPhone screen permits him: there’s a small pride flag above the bed, a Janet Jackson poster on the wall. “So I’m technically only biologically related to her. My sister is biologically related to my other mom, who’s not Korean. So she doesn’t look like me. It sounds super complicated but I swear if you were here it wouldn’t be confusing.” 

“Oh, wow,” Mingi just says, genuinely interested. “You know I wish I could have come. It’s so boring here.” Pause. “Do you speak any Korean?” 

“A little bit. Just not a lot because my moms couldn’t speak it together at home. I took it in high school, but it didn’t really come naturally to me.” 

Mingi hums understandingly. “ _Do you think you know enough to talk to me?_ ” he asks in Korean, and then giggles. 

“Uhhh,” Hongjoong says. “ _Maybe_ . I only know what my grandma says to me. _Hongjoong-ah, promise me you won’t get another tattoo!_ And then I say _I promise, grandma_.” 

Mingi laughs. “ _Liar._ ” 

“Huh?” 

“It means you’re a liar. Someone who lies. A tale-teller.” 

“I am not! What grandma doesn’t know can’t hurt her.” 

“What do you think she’d say if she knew you’re the one giving the tattoos?” 

Hongjoong shudders. “ _So you’re a criminal now, Hongjoong-ah? What’s next, selling drugs? You come to me asking to hide a body?_ ” 

Mingi laughs, partly because Hongjoong is funny and good at impersonating this old woman Mingi’s never met, but also because his Korean is bad enough to be kind of cute. 

“She sounds like my grandma. Do you think they’re friends?” 

Hongjoong shrugs and sighs. “Probably.” 

“I’m so sick of being here,” Mingi says, rolling over on his bed so he’s on his back, holding his phone above his face. “Everyone treats me like a baby.”

“You are a baby,” Hongjoong says matter-of-factly. Mingi rolls his eyes. “But I know what you mean. And Thanksgiving sucks extra when you’re vegan.” 

“Shit, I didn’t even realize. What do you even eat?” 

“My moms do like, half-American and half-Korean foods, and they try to make most things vegan for me, but my grandparents think it’s totally insane,” Hongjoong says, pulling one of his pillows under his chin. “They’re cool with everyone being gay, but like, as soon as I say I won’t eat grandma’s japchae ‘cause there’s beef in it, I’m the family disappointment. Like, make it make sense.” 

Mingi frowns. “I’m sorry. The more I hear, though, the more I’m really convinced that our grandparents would love each other.” 

At that, Hongjoong laughs so sweetly, and Mingi thinks that he’ll let himself miss him regardless of whether he’s allowed to or not. 

On the train back to Boston, after scrolling through what feels like his millionth tattoo instagram account, Mingi realizes that agonizing over the perfect tattoo for Hongjoong to give him is useless. He just wants something small. Something sweet. It doesn’t have to be insanely meaningful. The more he stresses about making it perfect and nice without being corny, and cool without being too edgy, the more he just doesn’t want to do it. So somewhere around Providence, he has a revelation. 

He tells Hongjoong when he sees him next, as they’re sitting on Hongjoong’s bed playing Smash. “I just want a heart. That’s it.” 

Then, his character (Meta Knight, obviously, because he’s cool as shit) kills Hongjoong’s character (Peach, obviously, because she’s small and pointy and beautiful). 

Hongjoong just laughs and pauses the game. “What do you mean you want a heart?” He taps Mingi’s chest playfully. “You’re the tin man?” 

That reference goes over Mingi’s head, but that doesn’t matter. He puts down his controller. “No, no, for my tattoo. I want cool stuff later. But right now I just want a little heart. Somewhere that no one can see it.” 

Hongjoong’s entire face lights up, and he smiles like the grinch (but if the grinch were a tiny sexy hottie with a dirty-blonde mullet and a _lot_ of teeth). “Mingi, seriously? That is _so_ fucking cute, God, I just want to eat you. Are you serious?” 

“Yeah,” Mingi says happily. “Can you do that?” 

“Can I do that? I was made to do that. God made me specifically to tattoo a heart on Mingi Song. No other purpose.” 

Mingi just blushes. 

“Can I do it now?” Hongjoong asks excitedly, pawing at Mingi like a big sexy cat. 

“Yeah, if you want.” 

Hongjoong just pounces on him and kisses him hard on the mouth, as an answer. 

When they’re finally done with that, Hongjoong jumps off him, darting to his desk and pulling out a bunch of shit from one of the drawers. “Okay, so where do you want it? Am I gonna have to shave you?” 

“Shave me?!” Mingi splutters from the bed. 

“I can’t tattoo on a hairy area! Do you want an infection?” 

“Hm. No.” 

“Okay, so where do you want it?” 

Mingi blushes again. He wonders if he’ll ever stop doing that, but then thinks about the absolutely feral looks that Hongjoong gives him sometimes and realizes probably not. “I was thinking, like, thigh?” 

Hongjoong groans from the other side of the room. “Mingi.” 

“What?” 

“You’re literally such a fucking treat.” 

“Sometimes I really do think you wanna actually eat me.” 

“I literally do!” Hongjoong says, dropping all his tattoo shit on his desk to come sit on Mingi’s lap. He presses his lips carefully to Mingi’s. Rubs his hands up and down his thighs. “God. This is gonna be nuts. Wait until I get my hands on these.” 

So Hongjoong makes Mingi lie down on the bed and take his pants off, very professionally of course, while he gets everything ready. Mingi doesn’t really grow that much leg hair naturally, but Hongjoong shaves a patch on his thigh anyway, “just to be safe!” 

“Are you sure you want it here? It’s gonna hurt more on the thigh than on like, your calf.” 

“Yeah,” Mingi says, nervous but firm in his decision. “It’s not gonna be huge. I’ll live.” 

Hongjoong just growls (literally growls!) and kisses him hard before pulling away and getting back to work. 

“First I’m gonna clean the area with rubbing alcohol,” he says, dragging the cold, wet gauze over Mingi’s skin. Mingi shivers. “Shh,” Hongjoong says. “Not gonna let you get an infection.” 

“Now I’m gonna draw the heart with this pen. Tell me if you don’t like it and we’ll redraw. You have to make sure you like it, like, literally you have to tell me if you aren’t a hundred percent happy about it. It’s gonna be on your body forever.” 

He settles between Mingi’s open legs on the bed, and with his careful little fingers, he draws a perfect heart on Mingi’s right thigh with this special purple pen. “How’s that?” 

Mingi looks down, inspects his leg. “I like it. It looks good.” 

“Are you sure? Now’s not the time to be shy, baby.” 

Mingi’s brain goes absolutely apeshit at the petname, which Hongjoong has only previously called him when their clothes have been off. This whole relationship thing is making him lightheaded. “I’m not being shy!” he whines. “It looks good. Start poking.” 

“Oh, so you call the shots now, huh?” Hongjoong asks playfully, and then actually fucking bites Mingi’s nose with those fangs of his (lightly, but still!). And oh, Mingi hadn’t considered the possibility of getting _hard_ with Hongjoong here between his thighs about to stick a needle into his skin about a hundred times. He concentrates super hard on the pain he knows he’s about to feel to will it away. 

All of the sudden Hongjoong produces a single needle in a sterile package from somewhere, which is interesting because Mingi had assumed he was just going to pull out a sewing kit or something. “What’s that?” Mingi asks. 

“Needle?”

“But it looks so… legit. Where’s the sewing needle?” 

Hongjoong frowns. “Stick and pokes are legit. You can order a pack of a hundred sterile tattoo needles off the internet for like seven bucks. Why punish yourself?” 

“Wow,” Mingi just says, almost dizzy. “I’m really dating a tattoo artist. My literal childhood fantasy.” 

Hongjoong just smiles his grinchy smile again and opens the package. Then, he squeezes a few drops of ink into a little plastic container, and dips the needle in. 

“Ready?” Hongjoong asks, hovering above Mingi’s thigh with the needle poised. “We can take a break at any time.” 

“I’m ready,” Mingi says, scrunching his eyes shut and grabbing a handful of Hongjoong’s comforter in each of his clenched fists. “Go.” 

And then he feels it, the needle passing through the first few layers of his skin, and it’s not unbearable but it definitely _hurts_ , and he lets out a little yelp without even realizing it. 

“Oh, baby, are you okay? We can stop,” Hongjoong says anxiously, peering at Mingi’s scrunched up face. 

“It’s fine, keep going,” Mingi says. “I just wasn’t expecting it.” 

“Brave,” Hongjoong coos, and goes in for another poke. He pokes and he pokes and he pokes, and Mingi lets out intermittent little whines but overall is a very brave and good boy. 

Hongjoong is almost finished when he pokes particularly deep, causing Mingi to groan a little bit. “Shh, angel, you’re doing so good. We’re almost done.” 

Mingi lets the thought of Hongjoong calling him “angel” act as a salve for the literal open, heart-shaped wound on his leg. 

A few more pokes and it’s over. Hongjoong is suddenly wiping his leg with some wet gauze again, and then squeezing some liquid over it, and then he’s done. 

“You’re done, Mingi,” Hongjoong says, almost breathless, looking at his handiwork. “Do you like it?”

Mingi takes a deep breath in, looks down at his thigh, and suddenly feels like he got the wind knocked out of him. A perfect black heart, stuck into his skin for the rest of his life. “Oh, my God. It’s there!” he says, unable to pull his eyes away. 

“You hate it?” Hongjoong says, chewing on his lip. 

“Hongjoong!” Mingi exclaims, laughing loud. “I love it! I love it. Woah.” 

“Really?” Hongjoong says. 

“Yes, oh my God,” Mingi says. “Thank you, you’re so talented, what the fuck.” 

“Don’t thank me, I wanted to do it. Normally I’d charge forty bucks for that, though,” he says, eyes glinting playfully (but also dangerously!). 

“Oh, what, for real, I can venmo you!” Mingi says, trying to reach his phone where he put it on Hongjoong’s bedside table. Hongjoong puts his hands on his chest, making him sit still. 

“Stop, I don’t want you to pay me, dummy,” Hongjoong says, reaching over to grab something from his pile of supplies. “There is something else that I want, though, maybe.” 

“Oh?” Mingi asks, cheeks growing red. “Like what?” 

Hongjoong just smooths something sticky down over the fresh ink on his leg. “This is called a second skin bandage. I want you to keep it on for the next, like, two days. Nothing can get through, it’s like waterproof and stuff. Can you do that?” 

Mingi frowns, laughing. “Yeah, I can do that. That’s all you wanted?” 

“Oh, yeah, so when you take the bandage off you need to wash it like twice a day with unscented soap, and then put a thin layer of Aquaphor on every morning and night.” 

“Okay,” Mingi says, rolling his eyes. “That’s it? 

“Hm, one more thing,” Hongjoong says, carefully moving all his tattoo materials to the floor. Once the bed is clear, he looks at Mingi like he’s a vampire about to suck his blood, makes sure his tattoo is sufficiently covered by the bandage, and then pushes him down and climbs on top of him. “I want _this_ ,” he murmurs, and then kisses Mingi, hard. 

Mingi just splutters against Hongjoong’s mouth, but adjusts pretty quickly, placing his arms around Hongjoong’s waist and pulling him closer. 

Hongjoong lightly holds both sides of Mingi’s neck with his little hands and makes quick work of licking into his mouth, rendering him helpless and useless and soft. “Mm,” he mumbles, nipping at Mingi’s lips and nose and neck. “You did so good.” 

“I did?” Mingi asks, his brain well on its way to its vacation house in Belize (which is where he’s decided his brain goes when Hongjoong kisses him like this). 

“Yup,” Hongjoong breathes, rolling his hips into Mingi’s, carefully avoiding rubbing up against his tattoo. “So good. But I knew you would be. You’re always— so— good.” 

Mingi just lets out a little whine and Hongjoong kisses him again, his lips traveling down his neck and to his chest and under his pushed-up t-shirt, where they finally come to rest on one of his nipples. He licks softly and then blows on the trail of his saliva, causing Mingi to squirm and his nipple to grow almost uncomfortably hard. Then he looks up at him for a split second, and Mingi just barely has time to notice he’s got a starved look in his eyes before he’s biting his nipple so lightly, causing Mingi to let out a little cry. “Too much?” Hongjoong asks, soothing the area he had bitten with his tongue. 

Mingi just shakes his head. “More,” he mumbles. “You can do more. If you want.” 

So Hongjoong pulls off Mingi’s shirt and then pulls off his own for good measure, throwing both of them on the floor somewhere, and dedicates the next five minutes to torturing Mingi’s nipples until he’s shaking and begging for him to stop. “Hongjoong,” Mingi pants when he feels like he’s truly not going to make it. “Too much.” 

“Mingi, Mingi,” Hongjoong says, leaning up to kiss him again, running his hands through his hair so tenderly. “Can I blow you?” 

Ahhhhhhhh, Mingi thinks! Part of him wonders if it’s safe to have all those pointy teeth near his dick, but the bigger part of him is just like “hell yeah” and so he says that, because there’s really nothing else he can say. 

Hongjoong laughs and nips lightly at his jaw one more time before slowly pulling off Mingi’s boxers, careful not to add unnecessary friction to his tattoo, and then all of the sudden he’s naked. Hongjoong presses small kisses to his hips, and then to his tummy right above where his dick is hard and leaking precum, and then finally he goes in for the kill and presses one small kiss to the head of his cock. Mingi shivers, full body. 

And then Hongjoong wraps his lips, his gorgeous pretty angel lips, around him and starts bobbing his head and Mingi feels like he’s cracked through the icy surface of some frozen lake and fallen in. And now he’s drowning and it’s too much and yet not enough, and he’s never felt anything like this before but he’s so glad he’s feeling it with Hongjoong. 

Dizzy, he tangles his hands in Hongjoong’s hair as he takes even more of him into his big, big mouth, and Mingi suddenly sees the end, he’s not going to last, and he pulls his brain back from the brink of perishing in its own private hot tub in Belize to tell Hongjoong to slow down. 

Hongjoong pulls off with a devilish little smile. “You okay?” he asks, resting his head against Mingi’s (non-tattooed) thigh. 

“I want— something,” Mingi breathes, eyes hidden behind his arm, which he had flung over his face about 30 seconds ago. 

“Anything,” Hongjoong murmurs into Mingi’s skin, sharp teeth grazing his inner thigh. 

Mingi takes a deep breath and says, “Fuck me.” 

Hongjoong bites him, hard. 

“Ow!” Mingi whines. 

“Sorry,” Hongjoong says, kissing the part of Mingi’s thigh he had bitten. “Are you serious?” 

“Yeah,” Mingi says, uncovering his face with his arm. “Why wouldn’t I be?” 

“Like, I just know… you haven’t done this before. Are you sure you don’t want to wait? I’m not expecting anything.” 

“Hongjoong,” Mingi laughs. “I’m here naked, in your bed. You just gave me a tattoo. I feel really close to you. I want to feel closer. I want you to fuck me. Do you want to do that, or no?” 

Hongjoong just breaks into a dazzling little smile, all his teeth on display but somehow still managing to look slightly bashful. He laughs into Mingi’s skin. “I want to do that.” 

And then they kiss a little bit more, giggling into each other’s mouths and swallowing the sounds. They’re both painfully hard when Hongjoong pulls away to extract something from his bedside table drawer. 

“Do you want me to prep you, sweetheart?” 

Mingi just nods, legs slightly trembling. His eyes are closed, and he hears the click of what he assumes is the lube in Hongjoong’s small, adept hands, and he feels movement below him, and then suddenly he feels his legs being gently pushed apart. 

“Can I?” Mingi hears Hongjoong ask.

“Uh huh,” Mingi breathes, eyes still closed. And then he feels a careful finger poking its way into him. “Ah!” 

Hongjoong can’t help but laugh. “Sorry!” he says, not sounding sorry at all, pushing his slick finger a little bit deeper inside of Mingi. 

It feels fine so far, feels normal even— Mingi hasn’t done extensive probing but he has fingered himself a few times, and this doesn’t feel too much different from that. 

It doesn’t feel too much different until Hongjoong adds another finger and goes a little bit deeper, deep enough to make something in his stomach clench and his whole body jolt. “All good?” Hongjoong asks, pressing another little kiss to his hip. Mingi nods. 

And then finally everything starts happening, the universe starts actively trying to kill him, when Hongjoong adds a third finger and takes Mingi’s cock into his mouth at the same time. Mingi lets out a noise that he can’t even confirm came from him, and everything is suddenly so much. The sensations in both areas are so overwhelming and Mingi doesn’t think he’s ever been this hard, and can’t do anything but whine and try to squirm around, but Hongjoong’s hand on his tummy prevents him from doing even that. 

Hongjoong pulls his mouth off Mingi’s cock right when he hits something deep inside of him, and the combination of the loss of sensation and the gaining of another one makes him let out an involuntary moan, and Hongjoong just continues to push against what he assumes is his prostate even harder, and faster, and Mingi’s brain is quickly packing its bags again. 

He’s starting to think that maybe he might cum just from this when he quickly tells Hongjoong, “Okay, stop, I’m ready, please, please, fuck me.” 

Hongjoong just rams into his prostate one more time before pulling out, wiping his fingers on his own thigh and grinning. “Okay.” 

So Hongjoong kicks his pants and boxers off, grabs a condom from his bedside drawer and strokes himself a few times before rolling it on, and Mingi finds himself begging without even realizing it, mumbling “please, please, Hongjoong, I need—” and then Hongjoong is suddenly shutting him up with a filthy kiss on his lips and licking so, so deep into his mouth to the point that his addled brain can’t distinguish where he ends and Hongjoong begins. 

“I know, baby, I know,” Hongjoong whispers against his lips. “I’m gonna take care of you.” 

And Mingi believes him, because right then Hongjoong’s pressing himself into him, so slowly, and it feels like nothing he’s ever felt before but so, unbelievably good. Hongjoong is too short to be able to reach up and kiss him in this position, but he rubs his little hands soothingly up and down Mingi’s chest, toying with his nipples just enough to make him twitch around his cock. 

When Mingi can’t take it anymore, feeling so full but without any friction, he whines, telling Hongjoong to “please move, please, holy shit.” And who is Hongjoong to deny him? 

So he thrusts in, and in, and in, and all Mingi can do is take it and fill the room with his tiny gasps and whines and moans, and God he’s fucked, he’s so fucked, he’s never experienced anything like this before. His cock dribbles precum onto his firm, clenching tummy and he covers his face with his arms because it’s all just so much. 

“Mingi, angel, come on,” Hongjoong coaxes, pulling his arms away from his face. “Let me see you, keep your eyes open for me. Fuck.” 

Mingi obeys, fluttering his eyes open and _wow_ , there’s Hongjoong up above him looking sweaty and feline and angelic, so small but pounding into him so well, making him fall apart so well. 

“Look at you,” Hongjoong breathes, panting and out of breath but still managing to look so predatory in a way that makes Mingi feel oddly comforted. “Look at you. So pretty, so perfect, all spread out under me.” 

Mingi doesn’t know what to say, doesn’t know if Hongjoong wants him to say anything at all, or if he wants him to just sit there and take his cock, listening to the words tumbling out of his mouth all filthy and obscene.

He wouldn’t have gotten the chance to speak even if he’d wanted to, though, because Hongjoong’s hands have moved to play with his nipples again, rendering him functionally brain-dead and useless. Mingi’s starting to feel his orgasm in the pit of his belly, heat pricking at his body from every angle, and he grabs his dick loosely just to take the edge off. 

“Are you close?” Hongjoong asks breathlessly, pressing his thumb hard into Mingi’s nipple. “Do you want to cum?” 

Mingi nods furiously, eyes scrunching shut again, and Hongjoong knows what he likes by now, so he just opens his mouth and lets whatever filth comes to his mind spill out. “Come on, open your eyes for me baby, let me see your pretty eyes, you’re almost there.” Mingi opens his eyes, obeying for the second time. “Good boy, so good,” he pants. “Can’t believe I’m the first one to stretch you out like this, fuck, Mingi, you’re taking me so well. Seeing you— like this, fuck. I’m so lucky. All mine, my pretty baby, angel, fucking Greek god, wanna keep you like this forever, wanna never not be fucking you, keep you stretched and full every second of the day. Would you like that?” 

Mingi just whines louder than he ever has, nodding and gasping and he’s never felt so special in his fucking life, so cherished and valued and safe. “Hongjoong,” he just mumbles pathetically, and Hongjoong takes over touching his cock and after a few good strokes with his strong little hand Mingi’s seeing black and white and red and yellow and then he’s cumming all over himself. He’s shaking and he hears the ocean in his ears and Hongjoong in the background somewhere saying “it’s okay, baby, it’s okay, it’s _okay_.” 

After he’s milked the last bit of cum from Mingi’s poor dick, Hongjoong moves to pull out, but Mingi wraps his legs around him, keeping him inside, and begs, “Don’t, I want you in me, keep going, please.” 

So he does, and now Mingi, so sensitive, hole spasming around Hongjoong’s cock, feels more than ever before but he loves it, he loves it so much and he wants to feel every part of Hongjoong and suddenly he doesn’t feel terrified to want him, and want him, and want him. 

He gets what he wants soon enough, before long Hongjoong is biting at Mingi’s fingers and cumming inside of him. Mingi doesn’t want him to pull out, but he does eventually, tying off the condom and throwing it away quickly. He wonders when his brain will come back from Belize to join him in Hongjoong’s room. Or if it ever will. He feels the cum on his stomach get wiped off, and he sends a silent thank you to Hongjoong because he’s not sure he trusts his voice just yet.

“Are you okay?” Hongjoong finally asks when their breathing has steadied, maneuvering them so they’re face to face with their legs tangled together. 

“Mmurgh,” Mingi says thoughtfully into the cotton of Hongjoong’s sheets. Hongjoong laughs melodically and pets Mingi’s head. 

“Yup,” Hongjoong says, softly and happily. 

“Kiss?” Mingi manages to get out, tilting his head up. Hongjoong, delighted, obliges, pressing his lips so sweetly to Mingi’s that he almost forgets about what they just did. 

The virginity he just lost. Fuck yeah! 

He knows virginity is absolutely a social construct invented by patriarchy and that it affects girls way more negatively than boys, and it’s 100% not real, etc., but that aside, he’s wanted to get fucked for so long and now he can totally say that he did. And with _Hongjoong_ , no less. And now, since he’s crossed losing his virginity off his bucket list, the next order of business is turning 21 so he can get a horizontal driver’s license, hell yeah! 

“I can’t believe you deflowered me,” Mingi says happily, nuzzling his head into Hongjoong’s chest. 

“You know that shit’s fake, baby,” Hongjoong says, frowning. “You’re still a beautiful flower.” 

“Whatever,” Mingi says, unable to tear the giant grin off his face. “Thanks.” 

“My pleasure,” Hongjoong replies, also grinning, and wraps his arms around him. 

“I think I want another tattoo,” Mingi says. 

“Already?” Hongjoong asks, bemused. “What do you want?” 

Mingi just laughs. “I want a life size tattoo of your dick, so I can keep it with me at all times.” 

Hongjoong chokes on the sound that comes out of his mouth. “Oh my God. I’ve created a monster.” 

“Mmm,” Mingi says, biting Hongjoong’s jaw lightly. “Yup!” 

Hongjoong just pushes Mingi down so he can climb on top of him like he’s one of those cat towers and kiss him all over. 

And all Mingi can think is how good it feels to be here with Hongjoong, just occupying the little place they’ve carved out for themselves in a city they both can’t call home. He wants to keep it for a little while. To keep this feeling bundled up tight in a place that no one can find but them. 

So when the sun sets at 4pm because it’s December now, he doesn’t even mind. He just keeps Hongjoong close and imagines kissing him in the snow, in the rain, in the sun, in the shine. He thinks that this is how it is, and how it will be. And for once, Mingi isn’t terrified by the thought. 

**Author's Note:**

> welp !!!!!! hope u enjoyed reading this as much as i enjoyed writing it..... taking it upon myself to add to the absolutely BARREN hongjoong/mingi ao3 tag..... plz don't hesitate to leave a comment/kudos whatever if u liked it, or if u didnt, or if u just wanna chat!!! MWAH <3
> 
> [kofi](https://ko-fi.com/whomstisthis)


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